218 
NOTE ON SPIROCHAETES IN CASTRATION TUMOURS 
OF PIGS. 
By J. BURTON CLELAND, 
Government Pathologist, Perth, Western Australia. 
{From the Pathological Laboratory, Department of Public Health.) 
In pigs in Western Australia it is of frequent occurrence to find at 
the seat of castration large oval fibrous tumours from the size of an 
hen’s egg to that of a tennis ball. These have a thick fibrous wall with 
a cavity in the centre, which is frequently small in relation to the size 
of the mass. The walls of this cavity are brownish-yellow and degene¬ 
rated and the contents usually sero-pus of a similar colour, though 
at times a large quantity of ordinary whitish purulent matter is found. 
In films made from this brownish-yellow pus and stained with weak 
carbol-fuchsin or Leisbman’s stain, varying numbers of spirochaetes 
mixed with minute cocci and bacilli and larger, occasionally spore¬ 
bearing, organisms will be found. These spirochaetes vary in length 
from 6 p or less to 12 p ,; their thickness varies from the most delicate 
tenuity to that of a tubercle bacillus ; the spirals may be three or four 
and perfectly regular or, on the other hand, quite irregular, and acute 
bendings even at a right angle may be seen. Further, some of the 
large apparently bacillary organisms may show slight undulations sug¬ 
gesting that they are large forms of this spirochaete. Sections of the 
tumour show a fibrous stroma, becoming more cellular towards the centre 
where it passes into necrosed tissue swarming with organisms, amongst 
which, sometimes in masses, spirochaetes may be found. Where the 
still living cells abut on the necrosed area, a varying number of 
eosinophile cells are revealed by Leishman’s stain. 
The occurrence of this spirochaete is especially interesting when 
viewed in connection with the presence in man under certain conditions 
of Spirochaetei refringens. Whether the spirochaete found in the 
